CNC milling machines, low price?

[small fish]

Hi guys, I just found some old entries / threads for pcb cnc milling machines.
Because there´s lots of these thingies on ebay, I wondered if someone made some experience with these (cheap) machines.

Of course, they´re cheap (around 200-500 euros / dollars) and I don´t expect any high-grade-top-notch-stuff, but it´ll be interesting for me
if there´s any fair offer, which I could try for home usage.

So, I´d highly appreciate any advice on some valueable mills out there.
Of course, if there´s any actual thread, plz send me a link.
tia,
regards,
Carsten

[madbean]

I recently got a 3018 machine just to plunk around on. Mostly to do light duty stuff as I don't expect it to be that robust:
3018 Mini CNC

The ER-11 collet seems to be a must for upgrades to the 3018.

This machine might be okay for some PCB milling or faceplates. Not sure about engraving directly to enclosures...maybe? Unfortunately, I haven't had time to put it together yet so I can't give you any good advice on it. But there are a lot of youTube videos about this machine and similar ones.

[sturgeo]

I recently got a 3018 machine just to plunk around on. Mostly to do light duty stuff as I don't expect it to be that robust:
3018 Mini CNC

Any chance to try this machine out yet? I'm after something for drilling pilot holes in enclosures before opening them out on a pillar drill.
As i'll be using a regular drill bit rather than end mill and only making plunges i'm hoping the lateral forces involved won't expose the weaknesses of these machines.

[Aristatertotle]

Is it a repeatable design that you're waiting to do, and only for pilot holes?

If so you may want to just look into getting something like a drilling template fabricated instead. Even with using drill bits, the z axis will only be able to exert so much pressure on them for anything even as small as like an 1/8"/ 3mm bit, so it'll be pretty slow going most likely with the small machines, and that's not when accounting for setting up a fixture to align/hold the enclosures in the same spot.

Might be more frustratingly slow than the precision is worth basically.